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Jannike Stelling is a photographer with a curious eye for all things colourful and pristine. Her latest offering Stages depicts a pastel-hued journey she embarked on in South Africa. “It was my first time visiting this country,” she says. “The city had just been cleaned up for the upcoming soccer World Cup — everything looked extraordinary clean.”

“I went there with my former boss to work for a photography commercial. I only had ten days to fill up with initial impressions….there were a lot of photographers and models from all over the world seeking beautiful sceneries for their own projects. It gave me a feeling of being on some kind of stage. I describe this feeling as the ‘ambivalence in the pictures of South Africa’, which is the subject of my work.”

Stages is the result of Jannike’s ability to translate personal influences into images. No hidden meanings or interpretations have been embedded within the pictures; rather, the series showcases a beautiful occurrence, demonstrating flair with presenting shape and colour. “I have a strong desire to see things arranged and clean. I can’t work in chaos and I transfer this condition into my images,” she says. “I like things to be sorted — in my head, chaos often rules.”

Having in fact failed art class in school, Jannike only took on photography by chance after accidentally ending up in an advertising photography studio. “From there on I was curious what the world of photography would offer me,” she says. “All the different experiences I encountered has introduced work for several photographers, picture editors, universities, family, friends and traveling. These experiences have formed me into the photographer I am at the moment.”

In photographer Grégory Michenaud’s ongoing project he explores Jewish identity, which takes him on a journey inside religion, family values and history. The project is inspired by an old Jewish tradition that’s not practised anymore, called “Yibbum” or levirate marriage, and it obliges the oldest surviving brother of a man who dies childless to marry the widow of his childless deceased brother.

If you Google image search Curacao, a Dutch island in the Caribbean, you’re met with a landscape of white sandy beaches sitting next to rows of pastel coloured architecture. The combination isn’t common, but as photographer Gilleam Trapenberg explains, “Curacao is an island of paradoxes”.

By toying with light and texture, photographer Marta Serrano’s latest series Enter my Dreams depicts the sensual existence of an intimate world presented through the lens. Each image tells a soft and poetic narrative that resonates with us all, leaving a sense of familiarity, wonder and empathy towards a male stranger.

Photographer Anna Beeke’s series At Sea is an ongoing exploration of American cruise culture. “The once romantic notion of travelling the ocean to distant lands has become an accessible and affordable way to vacation, with more and more people taking to the seas each year,” says Anna. “Cruising is the fastest growing sector of the tourism industry worldwide – this project takes a lighthearted look at what it is like to be a passenger on board these floating hotels and the places to which they take us.”

When photographer Michael Bodiam and sculptor Andrew Stellitano set out to collaborate, Michael happened to be reading In Praise of Shadows by iconic Japanese author Jun’ichirō Tanizaki. “It’s a short read but it’s packed with fascinating and inspiring observations,” Michael describes. “For me, the most captivating are when he explains how and why the beauty of certain surfaces, materials and objects can become elevated when viewed in near darkness.”

Russia-born photographer Nadia Sablin uses the medium to investigate “the relationship between documentary and fictional storytelling and explores the larger world through close personal narratives”. An example of this is Together and Alone a poignant series she completed as a graduate thesis project while studying an MFA at Arizona State University. The result is a series of photographs that stunningly document life in a way that is familiar, but still leave you with a sense of something peculiar.